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#FollowFriday These Mobile Marketing Companies & Thought Leaders

Justin — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 18:12:34 +0000

Today we continue our #FollowFriday segment in which we follow the many excellent companies and individuals that make up the fast-paced mobile marketing and advertising industries. If you have any suggestions for great companies or feel we’re leaving someone out, hit us up in the comments, tweet us at @mobileMW or shoot us an email at editor[at]mobilemarketingwatch.com.

This week we continue focusing on individuals and companies within the mobile marketing and advertising industries who represent thought leadership. These companies and individuals play an important role in the mobile segment through one capacity or another, so if you’re interested in learning more about what makes the mobile marketing industry tick — besides being a dedicated reader of MMW — do yourself a favor and follow the industry insiders and thought leaders we’ve compiled below. Also, if you’d like us to feature you and/or your company, please add a comment below. We’ll review the type of resources you publish and consider you in future posts.

AlertU @alertuhq	Mobile Internet Content Coalition @theMICC_org	Appia @appia	Opera Software @opera
Msgme @msgmehq	mobileStorm @mobileStorm	Tatango @tatango	Waterfall Mobile @waterfallmobile

#FollowFriday These Mobile Marketing Companies & Thought Leaders

Justin — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 21:55:29 +0000

Medl Mobile @medlmobile	Mobile Internet Content Coalition @theMICC_org	AppClix @appclix	BlisMobile @blismobile
Raster Media @rastermedia	mobileStorm @mobileStorm	4th Screen Advertising @mpression	Lenco Mobile @lencomobileusa

#FollowFriday These Mobile Marketing Companies & Thought Leaders

Justin — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 19:49:00 +0000

AdRemixer @adremixer	Mobile Internet Content Coalition @theMICC_org	AppClix @appclix	BlisMobile @blismobile
Celltick @celltick	mobileStorm @mobileStorm	4th Screen Advertising @mpression	Millennial Media @millennialmedia

#FollowFriday These Mobile Marketing Companies & Thought Leaders

Justin — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 16:59:19 +0000

Textopoly @textopoly	Mobile Internet Content Coalition @theMICC_org	Blue Bite @bluebite	Sundrop Mobile @sundropmobile
Dan Trigub @dantrigub	mobileStorm @mobileStorm	Barbara Maldonado @bmaldonado	Mobile Technology Association of Michigan @gomobilemi

Mobile Healthcare (mHealth) News Roundup

Justin — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 20:12:58 +0000

Harvard, Boston Children’s open $5,000 app challenge to free EHR data

Researchers at Children’s Hospital Boston and Harvard Medical School this week opened a previously announced competition to develop “iPhone-like” applications to help unlock data stored in electronic health records. While the focus is on Web apps, the federally funded contest is encouraging submissions for mobile tablets, with a promise of “further optimization for smaller screens” such as smartphones by summer. Children’s and Harvard will award $5,000 for the best application in June and release the winning product in a health IT “app store,” the organizations say.

Read more here

Apple’s iPad 2 May Promote Further Mobile Health Advancements

The burgeoning use of contemporary computing technologies in healthcare may increase exponentially with tomorrow’s release of Apple’s iPad 2. According to a new report from InformationWeek, “if the launch of Apple’s iPad 2 is any indication of what’s in store for mobile health, then 2011 promises to be a year of tremendous strides in the development of mobile devices and software applications used in healthcare.”

Read more here

The Coming Medical Tablet War

Last year, in MobiHealthNews’ first report on tablets in the healthcare space, iPad vs. the Tablets in Healthcare, we took a close look at Apple’s iPad, which had only just hit store shelves, but had already made a name for itself in healthcare. Seemingly from the get-go physicians began to realize the device’s potential to redefine their workflow. As we wrote in last year’s report, “Apple’s device holds the potential to be a game changer in the healthcare space in the same manner that it has transformed the market for consumer devices.”

Read more here

Dermatologists want payment for telehealth

No word yet on the outcome of last week’s meeting between the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the American Academy of Dermatology Association, American Telemedicine Association. But both of the latter two groups are pushing hard for CMS to add payment categories for dermatology consults provided via telehealth. They’ve already sent an official letter to CMS asking to have “teledermatology” included under the definition of “physician services,” in the Medicare Policy Benefit Manual, which guides what services Medicare will pay for. Their argument: Telemedicine technologies provide a high enough image resolution to allow detailed, assessment of skin conditions.

Read more here

Harvard students to launch mHealth, Health 2.0 incubator Rock Health

Four Harvard Business School students are launching a San Francisco-based mobile health and Health 2.0 incubator, Rock Health, that aims to provide healthcare expertise, development resources and eventually funding to winning ideas. The core team at Rock Health includes Medical Director Nate Gross (who is also involved with the soon-to-launch Doximity), Interim CFO Dan Monahan, Creative Director Leslie Ziegler and Managing Director Halle Tecco.

Read more here

Mobile Healthcare (mHealth) News Roundup

Justin — Sat, 05 Mar 2011 00:23:04 +0000

New FDA Rule For mHealth Apps Help Streamline The Approval Process

One of the many roadblocks developers face when innovating in the mHealth space is the approval process for clearing new applications with the FDA.

A new rule that was recently introduced, however, aims to streamline that process for certain applications. The new “Medical Device Data Systems” (MDDS) rule now exempts a portion of smartphone apps and wireless peripherals from the FDA’s pre-review requirements. Put simply, the new MDDS rule applies to medical devices or software that only collects, stores or transfers patient data. An example being an app that collects weight or other vital signs from plug-in peripherals and forwards that data to physicians.

Read more here

Walgreens: 1M subscribe to prescription text alerts

After just four months of launching “Refill by Scan,” Walgreens have found that users of its smartphone application have embraced the feature which enables them to use the camera on their phone to scan the barcode printed on a prescription label to order a refill. Walgreens said half of all refill orders originating from a mobile device are now from Refill by Scan. The feature has been available to users of Walgreens’ iPhone and Android apps since November 2010.

Read more here

New Tablet announcing at CTIA, hints of medical applications

CTIA Vice President Rob Mesirow has hinted that a new Android tablet will be announced at the annual wireless trade show. And though he wouldn’t go into any detail as to who’s making it or what the specs are, Mesirow did go on to talk about how tablets in general are changing Heath care thanks to what he calls “M-health” and that M-health news at CTIA this year. And as if hinting to one spec, Mesirow went on to state that a 7″ tablet fits rather nicely in a lab coat.

Read more here

Some Developers of Mobile Health Apps Seeking FDA Review

According to physicians, FDA has not provided guidance about which mobile health apps would need the agency’s approval and which would not. So far, few medical apps have undergone clinical trials or testing in academic medical centers. Some developers of medical apps are pursuing FDA approval on their own. For example, AirStrip Technologies decided to classify its remote patient monitoring software as a medical device, making it subject to FDA safety and efficacy reviews. FDA cleared the app in July 2010.

Read more here

12 mobile health stories from HIMSS

A number of longtime HIMSS attendees, including my colleague Neil Versel, pointed out that this year’s event in Orlando, Fla. had renewed energy. The past two years’ events were more staid on account of the down economy. The magicians at vendor booths had less flourish, anyway. Whether you are of the opinion that HIMSS has its mojo back, is tapping into a hype cycle or neither — what is undoubtedly true is that HIMSS has discovered mobile in a big way. As predicted by many, countless vendors demonstrated how potential customers could use tablets (overwhelmingly Apple’s iPad) and smartphones (still a good mix, but mostly iPhone and Android) to run new apps or legacy software.

Read more here

AT&T Announces New Initiatives for the Healthcare Industry

Continuing its momentum to help the healthcare industry improve patient care and reduce medical costs, AT&T* today announced two new patient care technology pilots, and new enhancements to the services delivered by AT&T ForHealthSM, AT&T’s healthcare practice area. The company also said it has been accredited to provide specialized information security consulting services to help healthcare customers streamline their security and compliance processes.

Read more here

Four more must-read mobile health reports

Last April we published a list of “five must-read mobile health reports” that were free to anyone to download. The list was an instant hit and in recent weeks I have had requests from a number of people for a refreshed list. As of March 2011, there have been four free, must-read mHealth reports by my count — and together they do a fine job of encapsulating a good portion of the mHealth conversation. Reading (or even skimming — some are lengthy) these four reports (in addition to last year’s five) makes for a fine primer on mHealth.

Read more here

GE Healthcare pushing its EMR onto iPad

Anxious to ride the iPad wave, GE Healthcare demoed two new iPad versions of its primary health software, Centricity Advance and Centricity Practice Solution, at HIMSS11 in Orlando last week. The applications already are available for use on smartphones and other mobile devices, but company statements indicate the iPad may actually be better suited to the software, given its ability to flick quickly through multiple pages of documents, and zooming in on certain parts of the screen.

Read more here

Healthcare App Dev Platform Supports More Mobile Devices

Diversinet has released an upgrade of its MobiSecure healthcare mobile application development platform, providing support for more devices as well as new features. Diversinet provides a secure middleware application development environment that lets its clients develop and deploy mobile health applications, ensuring that they’re HIPAA compliant. Among the applications it supports are case and disease management; personal health record access, storage and exchange; medical visits and treatment scheduling; and patients reminders.

Read more here

New app will give docs access to records ‘anytime, anywhere’

Doctors soon will be able to look at medical records whenever and wherever they need to–and email or video chat with other doctors about those records–thanks to a mobile application created by Southern California-based innovation leader Palomar Pomerado Health being unveiled this week at HIMSS11 in Orlando. The app, known as Medical Information Anytime Anywhere (MIAA), gives docs the ability to view records from any number of providers without having to worry about the compatibility of different software systems used, reports the San Diego Union-Tribune. MIAA breaks down records into a common format, according to the newspaper.

Read more here

Is passivity the future for home health monitoring?

Think there’s not enough evidence to prove the efficacy of wireless, home-based patient monitoring? Robin Felder, associate director of clinical chemistry and toxicology and a pathology professor at the University of Virginia, disputes that notion. Felder likes to cite a 2007 paper in the Journal of Telemedicine and e-Health. That paper showed a 74 percent reduction in the cost of caring for patients in assisted living with “passive” monitoring devices, and, notably, the rate of urinary tract infections in the study group dropped to near zero.

Read more here

Patient monitoring system earns FDA clearance

North Carolina-based wireless communications company Ascom announced Monday that Cardiomax, a patient monitoring component within its ClinicalConneX integration suite, received 510(k) clearance from the Food and Drug Administration as a medical device. Now, the company is looking to deploy its system nationwide, reports MedCity News.

Read more here

Would mHealth Profit From Cost-Effectiveness Research?

A respected health economist from the University of Chicago argued recently that cost-effectiveness research should be part of the scrutiny that new medical technology undergoes. The researcher, David Meltzer, was points out that since 1960, growth in health care spending has outpaced the rest of the economy by 2.5 percent per year. Compound that for 50 years and its no wonder we are facing health care financing crisis.

Read more here

HIMSS Interview: Humana’s chief strategy officer talks mobile health

Following the healthcare legislation and in a move toward diversification, last November health plan Humana acquired health care provider Concentra for about $790 million. This week the health plan built on that acquisition with a much smaller deal with South Africa-based Discovery Holdings: Humana is launching a joint venture with Discovery called HumanaVitality that will provide Humana members with wellness tools and rewards. Humana also will own 25 percent of The Vitality Group, Discovery’s US subsidiary, which will still offer its wellness solution to US employers that are not necessarily Humana customers.

Read more here

HP launches new telehealth push

After Hewlett-Packard bought Palm and it’s WebOS, for $1 billion last year, we knew the company was serious about mobile health. This year, HP is following up with a cadre of four new mHealth product partnerships–which it debuted at HIMSS11 in Orlando last week–plus some new hardware for mobile applications. It doesn’t exactly catch HP up to the blazing fast development going on at Apple or Google, but may signal growing momentum.

Read more here

#FollowFriday These Mobile Marketing Companies & Thought Leaders

Justin — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 21:43:09 +0000

Today, we continue focusing on individuals and companies within the mobile marketing and advertising industries who represent thought leadership. These companies and individuals play an important role in the mobile segment through one capacity or another, so if you’re interested in learning more about what makes the mobile marketing industry tick — besides being a dedicated reader of MMW — do yourself a favor and follow the industry insiders and thought leaders we’ve compiled below. Also, if you’d like us to feature you and/or your company, please add a comment below. We’ll review the type of resources you publish and consider you in future posts.

Cantor Gaming @cantorgaming	iVisionMobile @ivisionmobile	Raster Media @rastermedia	Tap.Me @tapmegames
MEDL Mobile @medlmobile	Placecast @placecast	ShopSavvy @shopsavvy	Verve Wireless @vervewireless

#FollowFriday These Mobile Marketing Companies & Thought Leaders

Justin — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 21:47:04 +0000

Today, we turn our focus to individuals within the mobile marketing and advertising industries who represent thought leadership. These individuals play an important role in the mobile segment through one capacity or another, so if you’re interested in learning more about what makes the mobile marketing industry tick — besides being a dedicated reader of MMW — do yourself a favor and follow the industry insiders and thought leaders we’ve compiled below. Also, if you’d like us to feature you and/or your company, please add a comment below. We’ll review the type of resources you publish and consider you in future posts.

Cantor Gaming @cantorgaming	Darren Withers mobileStorm @darrenwithers	Raster Media @rastermedia	Jason Goldberg Retail Geek @retailgeek
Hugh Jedwill Mobile Anthem @mobilebranding	Mack McKelvey Millennial Media @mackmckelvey	Jeffrey Sass Myxer @sass	SMS Industry News @smsindustrynews

Mobile Healthcare (mHealth) News Roundup

Justin — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 21:38:15 +0000

mHealth: FDA approves incredibly cost-effective mobile ultrasound

By combining the computing power of Microsoft smartphones with a reasonably small hardware add-on, Seattle-based Mobisante is releasing what is perhaps the cheapest ultrasound system in the world - and it has just been approved by the FDA. MobiUS is the name of the product. When you buy it, you get a TG01 Windows Mobile smartphone. It comes with an ultrasound probe attached, and MobiSante’s software on-board. The entire system will cost less than $10k – in an industry where the average ultrasound unit retails for between $20k and $100k.

Read the rest here

FDA clears first diagnostic radiology app, Mobile MIM

Mobile MIM was one of the very first medical applications to debut in Apple’s AppStore when it first launched in 2008, but the application also has the distinction of being the first medical application pulled from the store because of regulatory concerns. Today those concerns are over: The US Food and Drug Administration has officially granted the mobile radiology application a 510(k) clearance. The app enables clinicians to measure distance, intensity values, display measurement lines, annotations and regions of interest. The images are securely transferred to the app from a hospital or physician’s office through a secure network transfer facilitated by MIM.

Read the rest here

WebMD launches Medscape for iPad, Android

WebMD may be sewing up its dominance in the smartphone-enabled clinical education space, launching two new versions of its Medscape Mobile product for iPads and Android phones. This comes more than seven months after the company’s initial foray into the iPad market, and nearly a year and a half after Medscape launched its iPhone mobile service. That’s in addition to existing apps already working on iPhones and Blackberry devices. Total users so far: 700,000, a number WebMD indicates should skyrocket with the addition of iPad and Android platforms. The mobile version of Medscape already was named the “most downloaded” free medical app last year by Apple.

Read the rest here

Mobile Health Startup Massive Health Gains $2.25 Million

Massive Health, a Dogpatch Labs startup co-founded by former Firefox Creative lead Aza Raskin and Sutha Kamal, just announced $2.25 million in funding from Andreessen Horowitz, Charles River Ventures, Felicis VC, Greylock Discovery Fund and Mohr Davidow Ventures as well as unnamed angel investors. In the same mobile health space as apps like Nike + and Jane McGonigal’s Social Chocolate, Massive Health aims to bring “the kind of innovation we expect from the Internet world to healthcare.” The co-founders write on their blog that they aim to incorporate elements of crowd-sourcing, game mechanics and social networking into helping someone stay healthy, “We are talking about tight feedback loops and deep insight into the interface which is your body.”

Read the rest here

Five mobile security tips for hospitals

During a recent interview with Becker’s Hospital Review, Dr. Barry Chaiken, the former chair of HIMSS and now chief medical officer for Imprivata, shared five tips for hospitals still trying to formulate a security strategy for the mobile devices their physicians, nurses and other staff are increasingly using. If you’re not familiar, Imprivata is a security solutions provider. While these are very high-level strategies, Chaiken’s list should be heeded. Security issues are more often than not an under-discussed issue in mobile health, especially for healthcare professional users.

Read the five tips here

Mobile Healthcare (mHealth) News Roundup

Justin — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 22:51:12 +0000

mHealth: custom-designed apps can help market healthcare professionals

Last week, we ran a story about ePractice.eu – the company predicts that hospitals and doctors will become the main distributors for mhealth applications, rather than app stores. Conveniently, this week sees a release from Pixineers – a company that develops custom-built mobile apps for medical professionals. Pixineers got it’s start developing apps that show before-and-after results for cosmetic surgeons. Examples include Dr.90210 (an app for the Simoni plastic surgery in Beverly Hills) and the Dr. Nassif Rhinoplasty and Cosmetic Surgery app.

Read more here

Interview: iPhoneECG ready for Android, too

In an expansive interview with MobiHealthNews, Albert explained the many uses cases for his single lead ECG device; why he thinks there are too many complaints about FDA regulation of mHealth; next steps for the iPhone ECG device; and more. Albert also let it slip that his ECG case for the iPhone is already working with at least one other smartphone. The Android version is already done: “We have it working on the least expensive Huawei Android device,” Albert said. “We will make a credit card sized device that will allow this to work with any tablet, any smartphone, any laptop in the future.”

Read more here

Mobily launches baby ultrasound MMS service

Etihad Etisalat (Mobily), the leading Saudi telecom company, has launched Baby Ultrasound MMS service, an innovative solution for expecting parents, in cooperation with Dr Sulaiman Al-Habib Medical Group. With this new mHealth initiative from Mobily, expecting parents can receive their baby’s ultra sound image and video via MMS after their visit to their doctor at Dr Suliman Al-Habib Hospital.

Read more here

Health sensors improving but not yet elegant

It’s time for a reality check in mobile and wireless home health, specifically in the area of body sensors. And this bit of buzzkill comes from someone at the forefront of the field, namely Dr. Joseph Kvedar, director of the Center for Connected Health at Partners HealthCare System in Boston. “Most of the time, I write from the perspective of a technology vision that includes continuous (or near continuous) sensing of multiple physiologic signals. These signals are flawlessly transmitted to a computing environment where decision support can be applied to aid in improved communication with patients and improved decision making by providers,” Kvedar writes in his most recent blog post.

Read more here

Pharma continues push into mobile

Communicators and marketers weighed in on mobile health this morning, looking at programs as wide-ranging as corporate brand apps to public health initiatives at a Business Development Institute event in New York. Kate Bird, director of digital communications policy, external affairs, and communications at Pfizer, said that the drugmaker launched the mobile version of Pfizer.com this week. She added that the company chose the website’s “about Pfizer,” news and media, products, and investors sections to be included in the mobile version of the website after finding that mobile traffic was highest in those sections of the site.

Read more here

Remote patient monitoring to grow 26 percent

According to a research report from Kalorama Information the market for remote and wireless patient monitoring is set to grow about 26 percent annually through 2014. “With increased waiting times at doctors’ offices, some employees may have to take a sick or personal day to see the physician for what might be a routine visit and technology might help avoid that scenario,” Kalorama stated in its release. Kalorama said these systems will grow by over $6 billion this year.

Read more here

Diabetes Patients are the main target for mHealth App developers

The majority of today’s mHealth smartphone applications fall into the category of general health tracking and fitness tools. Generally these apps have a low to medium sophistication level. Chronically ill people have not yet been the focus of today’s app developers. This will change with the entrance of traditional health industry players into the mHealth app market. With the potential for sophisticated monitoring, compliance, time-management and a host of other applications to improve healthcare delivery to chronically ill patients, mHealth solutions promise to bring significant advances in the management of chronic diseases. In addition, the target group size is very impressive. According to the OECD and WHO there are more than 2 billion patients with chronic diseases worldwide.

Read more here

Mobile healthcare key to improved minority outcomes

Smartphones, health apps and other mobile health technologies may prove more valuable than a hospital-based EHR for improving communication with minority patients. A set of five studies, published by the American Health Information Management Association’s Foundation’s Perspectives in Health Information Management, dug into everything from using cell phones to manage diabetes among minority patients in urban areas to how mobile devices affect health access by Native Americans, reports Healthcare IT News.

Read more here

Inova Selects Oracle For Healthcare Informatics Platform

Announced Tuesday, Inova, a Northern Va.-based, non-profit healthcare provider network serving more than one million people annually, said it will use Oracle’s technology to create a data services hub that links patient information through an interoperable informatics infrastructure across operational, clinical care, and research domains. Executives from both companies said the technology will help Inova unlock the value of data captured in disparate healthcare transactional systems to accelerate research and yield new clinical and translational insight.

Read more here